by K. F. Breene
“It’s clearing a little.”
Charles pointed to the tree with the older scar before moving on. “These traps aren’t springing. I don’t know why.”
“Maybe they just haven’t been reset…”
Charles grinned as they kept moving. “That’s what I was thinking. But why not?”
An area cleared of mulch underfoot opened up in front of them, the forest floor looking like it had been swept recently. Only new pine needles and a pinecone littered the area. He took a few pictures, before moving on.
“I wonder what that was for,” Ann mumbled.
Charles glanced back, and saw that she was checking out the area like he had, and slowed. She shook her head and walked on, about seven feet behind him. He started again as she did, when a sound like a spring attached to a rocket blasted out. He jumped and spun in time to see two nets, one from each side of Ann, wrap around her body.
A thrill of fear went through him, echoed in their link, as he stepped toward her. The ground opened up beneath her feet, a door swinging downward. She fell with a scream, struggling with the netting wrapped around her.
Charles skidded to a halt at the mouth of the hole, looking down into a black pit at least fifteen feet deep.
“Noooo!” Ann said through clenched teeth, struggling with the net. Her body was changing, though. Green enveloped her.
The other serum was active.
“Shit.” A list of spells ran through Charles’ head, but nothing would help with this. Nothing would hold that door open if it decided to close.
These people were about to find out what really went bump in the night…
As Charles prepared to jump down, a metal grate slid across the opening, cutting him off.
“No!” he yelled, bending to his knees to rip at that grate.
“Get help, Charles,” Ann said through painful grunts. “Don’t stay. Get help. Get Sasha.”
“I won’t leave you here, Ann!” Charles answered through clenched teeth.
“Get hrrrrp.” Her face changed, her jaw lengthening and growing fur, turning into a mountain lion.
Helplessness and desperation raged through Charles as the link, the new link he shouldn’t have been comfortable with yet, was dulled into nothing. He couldn’t feel her emotions in an animal state, just that she was alive.
“No, Ann,” he begged, ripping at the grate with pain welling up in his chest. “Please, no.”
The cry of a mountain lion blasted up at him. Gold feline eyes shocked into him from the pit. She stood on all fours, baring her teeth. If he hadn’t known better, he’d have said she’d shed all her fear with her human body.
Get help.
He’d do better. He’d get the most vicious, crazy bastards he knew, and he’d come back and blow this whole place to hell.
“Stay alive, baby,” he said down to her, his heart ripping out of his chest. “Stay alive. I’ll get you out of here, okay? Just hang on.”
A feline grunt answered him, those gold eyes cleared of all the haze.
She’d fight. Now that she was in the middle of it, she’d fight. He knew it as well as he knew his own name. She might’ve been afraid of what might come when she was a human, but in her primal form, she was hell with claws. Intelligent hell with claws. Who held a grudge.
That’s my girl.
A heavy door squealed within the pit. Ann turned that way, taking a few steps back.
“We got another one,” a mid-range voice said as a door opened a crack. Charles would remember that voice.
“It still trapped in the nets?” There was a man behind the one Charles could see.
“Mostly. It’s standing, though. It’s acting like those others—no sign of fear.”
“Those others gave us trouble, Ralph. Best hit it with the shock first.”
“Nah. I got a tranq dart fit for an elephant.” The door opened farther, shedding light in the pit.
Charles saw that Ann was in a cage of sorts, metal bars all around her. The top was open, but the grate made it impossible to escape upwards. A lock held a gate closed. The space was about ten feet by ten feet, with the cage taking up most of that.
Charles snapped off pictures with his phone since the light would disrupt the night vision of the camera. He took pictures of Ralph as he raised a stun gun at Ann, firing off the promised tranquilizer dart. She didn’t make a sound as it struck her. Instead, she stared at them while remaining in the proud stance of a great cat.
Her back legs wobbled, but she didn’t fall. She continued to stand and stare, as if challenging an intruder to her den.
“Shoulda gone down by now.” Ralph looked at his gun in confusion.
“Hit it with another. These things are smart. We don’t want to take any chances like the last time. Sam can’t see out of one eye.”
“I know, I know.” Ralph dug in his pocket and came out with a package. “Yup. These are the right ones. Should put this creature out for a whole day, minimum. Why didn’t it go down…?”
“Hit it with another!”
“I don’t want to kill the thing,” Ralph spat back. “We wouldn’t get our bonus with a dead critter on our hands.”
Charles looked at the grate again, wondering if he could get it open. If he could it would be easy to kill those guards and take back Ann.
“I’d rather lose a bonus than lose my life. Hit it with—”
“All right, all right…” A pop sounded, drawing Charles’ attention back.
Another dart hit Ann’s side. She stood firm for a moment, before her legs started to wobble again. She swayed, looking proud before finally falling.
Charles’ heart started beating faster. Something was breaking inside of him as he witnessed her taken down right before his eyes. He couldn’t help her. He couldn’t get down there and save her.
“There it goes…” Ralph stepped toward the cage as Ann fell, giving a weak growl as she did so. “A fighter, this one. Was probably a military guy, like the other group.”
“Get the cattle prod, just to be sure,” the other guard said.
Charles sucked in the elements, pulling at fire the hardest, mixing it with air. His tattoos swirled with color as he looked down at two dead men. It was Ralph that noticed, looking up in confusion, and then wide eyes.
Charles shed everything about him that could identify with humans. Anything connected with soft-willed compassion, with temperance and peace, he let go. Then, feeling Ann’s magic pulsing through him, he boosted his killer instincts. He gave himself over to his primal side as he stared down at the dull blue eyes of Ralph, dead man number one.
“What the—” Ralph cut off before the smell of urine wafted up. Piss puddled around Ralph’s feet.
Charles sent down his own cattle prod, shocking Ralph with the spell Sasha had used since day one. The electricity zapped him, throwing him back.
That’s when the other guard looked up, dead man number two.
Charles let the shadows crawl around him, shrouding him in darkness. He amped up his presence, seeing the terror in the eyes of his prey.
They would never forget this moment. They’d be haunted by the fear of him until he cut their worthless lives out from under them. Because they knew Ann was a human. That she was a person. They knew all the creatures they captured were still people. It was bad enough to treat animals the way they did, but this facility was going a step beyond with human experiments. And the experimentation wasn’t even for the greater good of humanity, it was to figure out what made shifters different so the scientists and executives could bottle it up and sell it to the highest bidder.
Rage overcame Charles as he stood, shadows masking him from the human eyes below. He turned and walked away from the woman he loved with his heart ripping out of his chest.
Because he did love her. He’d loved her since the beginning. He knew that now. There was no thought in it. No second-guessing. She was the woman that had always had a tight hold on his heart, he just hadn’t been ready to se
e it.
Well, he was ready now. He just hoped it wasn’t too late.
Chapter Ten
“Jonas, they’ve got Ann.” Charles sat on the hood of his SUV in front of the cabin. He’d thought about getting farther away in case someone came calling, but immediately decided against it. He hoped someone came.
There was a brief pause before Jonas said, “Did you call Tim?”
“No.”
“The Boss?”
“Left a message.”
“You gonna tear that bitch down?”
“Yes.” Charles looked out through the silent darkness. “Shifters are no good to us in this. They have some kind of special serum up here. We need our kind, and humans with magic. I sent info to Jameson but I don’t intend to wait until he has a plan.”
“I’ll leave here in twenty. Don’t do anything stupid until I get there.”
Charles dropped the phone to his lap, still staring out into the night. Jonas gave him a lot of shit, but that male would drop everything to help a brother-in-arms, and that included Ann. She was one of the group, despite technically being under Tim’s authority. They didn’t let one of their own get taken without doing everything they could to rescue her. Without retaliating hard and fast.
* * *
Half the night later, a Hummer rumbled into the small driveway. Behind it rolled a line of cars. Jonas had brought an arsenal just as Charles had known he would.
The large male got out, his face grim. Paulie stepped out from the passenger side, a handgun sticking out of the front of his pants. He took a quick glance around before he walked up beside Jonas. The sound of car doors opening and closing filled the night, large males and females in leather gathering around, ready to unleash hell.
“The Boss and Sasha are taking care of something for the Council,” Jonas said as he looked at the cabin, and then out at the trees. “They’ll be here as soon as they’re done. I told them you didn’t want to wait. Boss said that was fine, he’d run cleanup.”
“Yeah, we’re going to have to track more than a few scientists and guards down after this. All the daytime employees.” Charles jumped off the hood, holding out his hand to shake with Jonas. He did the same to Paulie. “Thanks for coming.”
“They don’t take one of ours.” Paulie spat and shifted, resting his hand on the handle of his gun. “I brought some street guys. They don’t do magic or any of that shit, but they know how to fuck shit up. Thought you might need that to destroy whatever lab they got in there.”
“Good.” Charles went over how the lab caught shifters, and showed pictures of the various entranceways. When he was finishing up, another car rolled up the road, parking behind the others. After the lights shut off, another male in battle leathers made his way up.
“Jameson,” Charles said with a surge of gratitude. Besides the Boss, Jameson was the best leader in battle. He still hadn’t warmed to shifters the way Jonas and the Boss had, so Charles hadn’t thought he’d jump the gun on a full-scale attack just to save one particular shifter. “You made it.”
Jameson glanced at the cabin before shaking Charles’ hand. “Ann’s always been cool with me. She’s fought beside us, saved our Mage, and kept you in line. She doesn’t deserve to be in that place.”
“And someday we might be the ones in the lab. Better to show our good will, ay Jameson?” Paulie grinned at him. “You’re transparent, bro.”
Jameson scowled in response.
“Time’s wasting. Let’s get in gear,” Charles badgered.
“Those traps you talked about—they are shifter specific?” Jameson asked, all business.
“They have to be. I walked right over it. Right over it. Ann stopped, I was seven feet away, and it triggered. Somehow they can tell when it’s a shifter and when it’s not. I have no idea how.” Charles shook his head as cold determination washed through him. The emotion didn’t stem from him.
“Ann’s awake.” He let the breath out of his lungs slowly, controlling the mad panic to get to her. “She’s… angry and determined.”
“Blood link?” Jonas asked casually.
Charles just nodded. Jonas matched the nod. No explanation necessary.
“We’ll be walking right through the front gate,” Jameson explained, jerking his head toward Jonas’ car as he started walking that direction. Everyone else followed him. “I brought tech guys. They’ll monitor and cut out any outgoing signal before we engage. Once that’s done, and we have what we came for, they’ll destroy any evidence.”
“We need to burn this whole place to the ground,” Charles cut in as they stopped behind Jonas’ Hummer. “We can’t have someone else getting the data on shifters.”
“We will acquire all the data, and then we’ll burn the place to the ground. Or maybe blow it up,” Jameson explained. “We won’t know until they’ve looked over the facility. I want a day, though. If there is tech here we don’t know about or have, I want it. After we’ve stripped this place of its value, then we can tear it down.”
“You’re the boss.” Charles’ eyes widened as the Hummer tailgate dropped down, showing the interior. Duffle bags containing weapons, stacked high, stared at Charles. Usually they used swords and daggers, but in this trunk lay guns and explosives of all kinds.
Paulie stepped forward and took a semi-automatic assault rifle off the top. “We’re not battling a bunch of magical shit. These are humans protecting some bullshit research. They’ll have guns. I am making sure we have bigger guns.”
“Can you make us invisible yet?” Jonas asked Paulie, taking a similar gun.
“Sure, if you wanna die. I keep inverting the fucking thing and blowing shit up.”
“We don’t need it—we can use the darkness to mask us. These humans don’t know anything about our kind.” Charles took the assault rifle from Paulie as a wave of pain flowed through the link.
“They’re hurting her. We gotta go.” Charles could hear the panic in his voice. He didn’t care.
“Let’s get on it.” Jameson looked behind him at the assembled warriors. “Get armed. Let’s go.”
* * *
Ann clenched her teeth as the knife dragged down her arm. A ruddy-faced guard in a gray uniform grinned in at her. “That hurt little lady?”
“What if I stuck that knife in your eye? Would that hurt?” Ann shot back.
The guard chuckled and stepped back, his gaze drifting down her naked body. They hadn’t given her anything to cover herself with when she’d woken up, having naturally changed back into a human. She assumed they would when the scientists returned, since everyone else wore hospital gowns, but it seemed this guard wanted to enjoy the sight of a nude female body.
She ignored it as she looked around, scrutinizing the room. She wanted to map out all possible means of escape.
Large cages lined the wall. Half were filled with people she knew, the other half with strangers. She was one of only three women. The strangers were either wild-eyed and desperate, or dull-eyed and nearly lifeless.
In contrast, her pack-mates sat placidly, watching. Hard eyes in grim faces. Eventually someone in this place would slip up, and when they did, Ann’s crew would take advantage of it, no matter how long it took. These scientists were used to dealing with animals. Chimps were smart, sure, but they weren’t as smart as humans. That was something the scientists might forget.
Ann felt a dribble of blood crawl down her arm. She looked at the wound, relieved that it wasn’t deep.
The room was probably forty feet by fifty feet with high ceilings and sterile, metal surfaces. The far wall had more cages lined up—Ann could barely see the tops. She had no idea if they were occupied. In the middle of the floor were operating and dissecting tables, lab stations, harnesses and holsters, many of which looked like they were for large animals. Medical supplies in plenty lined shelves at the end of the room and hung on walls. At the far end were stations with lab equipment.
“They’re supposed to be testing us to see if we feel pai
n,” Roger, the pack-mate in the next cage over, said in a low tone as the guard stood by the far door of the lab, cleaning his knife. “During the day, it’s just a needle prick. When the scientists aren’t around, though, it’s a knife. The day guards are mostly cool, but the night guards are screwed up in the head. They’ve got problems.”
“Do those problems then become our problems?” Ann asked in the same low tone so as not to be overheard.
“No, except for cattle prods and knives. The cages are locked with codes. The guards don’t know the codes.”
“To protect us from them, or them from us...?” Ann mumbled to herself.
“They’re trying to get the woman at the end pregnant.” Roger pointed to the furthest of the cages.
Ann tried to remember the woman in the cage when she’d been coming to as they brought her in. Small and docile-looking, the woman was extremely skinny and vapid, having long since given up and now probably just waiting for death.
Ann grimaced as her stomach crawled.
“No, not like that,” Roger said, apparently reading her facial expression. “It’s clinical. Extracting our sperm, though… isn’t.”
“So they’re using you guys to see if she can get pregnant?”
“Yeah. I think they plan to use human sperm for the other woman, to see if that would work better. They’ve used our sperm to try and impregnate the types of animals we turn into, too. It’s all fucked up. All they have to do is ask us. They pretend we can’t talk. And if we do talk, we get a shock collar.”
“Can’t you just take off the collar?”
“There are worse things than shock collars. Just keep your mouth shut.”
“But they let you talk when they’re gone?”
Roger nodded, picking at his nail. “They know we’re human. They know it. I can see it in their eyes in flashes. In the next second, though, the humanity shuts off and the gleam of a big brain takes over. We are a puzzle, and the first to solve that puzzle gets a prize. At least, that’s what it seems like.”
